Iraq seeks exemption from OPEC cuts

BAGHDAD — Iraq threw an obstacle in OPEC’s path toward a final deal to stabilize oil markets when it balked at joining efforts to trim output to prop up crude prices.

The group’s second-largest producer should be exempted from cutting production because it’s embroiled in a war with Islamic militants, Oil Minister Jabber Al-Luaibi said Sunday at a news conference in Baghdad. Iraq currently produces more than the 4.7 million barrels a day it pumped in September, and output could rise still higher as the government urges international companies to boost production at its fields, he said. The minister disputed Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries figures that peg Iraqi output at fewer than 4.2 million barrels daily.

“We are with OPEC policy and OPEC unity,” Al-Luaibi said. “But this should not be at our expense.” A meeting in Algeria last month of the group’s 14 members stretched to seven hours as Iraq argued over the level of production that should be used as a baseline for setting quotas.

OPEC is trying to woo other producers to join in the group’s first output cuts in eight years, a policy shift that members agreed to in Algeria.